Thread: Mnemomics

Hi

Are there any mnemomics that can be used when learning Russian.

Here's a mnemonic rhyme that I made up a couple years ago to help people understand the basic functions of noun cases, and also to learn the case-endings for "Type 1" feminine nouns, using девушка ("girl") as a model. The words or syllables in blue refer to the names of the cases, and the rhyming words (in green) help to remind you of the feminine endings (in red).

"Nom, nom, nom," said the девушка,
As she ate up all the baklava.
[The nominative case is used for the subject of a verb/sentence. In this case, девушка (girl) is the subject of "said".]

Shy guys generally flee
From a девушки.
[One of the most common functions of the genitive case is to show movement away from someone/something.]

Commander Data gave the tray
To the девушке.
[The dative case is used for indirect objects. Here, "tray" is the direct object of the verb "gave", and "the girl" who received the tray is the indirect object.]

I threw my shoe
But my aim wasn't true
And I accidentally hit the девушку!
[Here, the accusative is used because "the girl" is the direct object of the verb "hit".]

The old cowboy
With his девушкой
Played an instrumental version of "Ode to Joy".
[The instrumental case has a number of functions, but one is to show accompaniment -- that is, hanging out or doing something with another person.]

President Clinton spent his day
Thinkin' 'bout the девушке.
[The prepositional case gets its name because it ALWAYS has a preposition before it. Here, the preposition is "about" -- in Russian, "about the girl" would be о девушке.]

Hope this helps, at least a little!

Very nicely done, Throbert
Did the president think about Monica ?

Probably
Игорь Иртеньев | * * *

Throbert McGee, thank you for the interesting post!
What particularly makes it interesting for me are the rhymes like

Originally Posted by Throbert McGee

Commander Data gave the tray
To the девушке.
[The dative case is used for indirect objects. Here, "tray" is the direct object of the verb "gave", and "the girl" who received the tray is the indirect object.]

President Clinton spent his day
Thinkin' 'bout the девушке.
[The prepositional case gets its name because it ALWAYS has a preposition before it. Here, the preposition is "about" -- in Russian, "about the girl" would be о девушке.]

I'm afraid my question might be a bit out of the topic, it purely deals with the pronunciation, but it is one of the intriguing things for me.

I am aware of the fact that native English speakers rhyme the English "ay" [eɪ] sound (say, day …) with other languages’ [e] and [ɛ] (e.g. English "say" – Russian "все" – French "ses" [se] – French "sais" [sɛ] – Spanish "José" etc.).
What puzzles me is that, as to my ears, the English "ay" does not rhyme with the Russian "э/е" at all. I definitely hear the "ay" as a diphthong, which sounds quite similar to the Russian "эй" combination. I clearly hear the "-y" [-ɪ] glide here: say "сэй", day "дэй" etc.
So, I would say that the English "say" would rather rhyme with the Russian "всей", but no way it rhymes with "все".

It’s very interesting to me if you could explain:

1. Does an "average" English speaker really hear the sound "ay" to rhyme with the Russian "э/е" or they just use this rhyme because the English [ɛ] (as in "bed") never occurs word-finally?
2. I believe all English speakers as well as all Russian speakers hear the words "met" and "mate" differently. Then, "may" has the same vowel as "mate", right? If we ask to compare those words with Russian "мэт" (if such a word existed), they would say it more resembles "met", not "mate". Would the same logic work if we ask to compare English "may" with Russian "мэ" (if such a word existed)?
3. Do English speakers "hear" the second element (glide) of the diphthong "ay" in their speech? To my ears, this glide is the main thing which makes "met" and "mate" sound differently.
4. The most interesting question: would an "average" English speaker hear the difference between Russian "все" and "всей", "уже" and "ужей" (genitive plural of "уж") etc.? If yes, how would they describe the difference?

It's not even an [e] sound but some kind of unstreesed schwa.

Originally Posted by Marcus

It's not even an [e] sound but some kind of unstreesed schwa.

Do you mean the Russian sound in "девушке"? Yes, I agree, it's a kind of schwa, not exactly, but yes...

However, let's put it in a more generic way: what is we had a stressed vowel? Say, "сестре"?
In my examples above all the е's are stressed.

I'm curious what native English speakers think of that.

Ha Ha ...brilliant Throbert ....PMSL, that was what i was hoping for, was also hoping that there would be some native Russian ones that get taught to schoolchildren for verb conjuctions etc

Originally Posted by Alan

Ha Ha ...brilliant Throbert ....PMSL, that was what i was hoping for, was also hoping that there would be some native Russian ones that get taught to schoolchildren for verb conjuctions etc

Гнать, дышать, держать, зависеть
Видеть, слышать и обидеть
А еще терпеть, вертеть, ненавидеть и смотреть.
These are all verbs of the second conjugation with unstressed endings, and not ить verbs.

Originally Posted by Боб Уайтман

[*]Does an "average" English speaker really hear the sound "ay" to rhyme with the Russian "э/е" or they just use this rhyme because the English [ɛ] (as in "bed") never occurs word-finally?

Excellent questions, Боб! In my "mnemonic", I took some liberties with the rhymes/pronunciations for exactly the reason you guessed: because the [ɛ] doesn't occur as the final syllable of any English words. (Except for a couple of interjections, which I'll come to below.)

But, of course, the main intention of this mnemonic was not to teach correct pronunciation, but to introduce English-speaking students of Russian to the alien (for us!) concepts of "noun declension" and падежи.

Do English speakers "hear" the second element (glide) of the diphthong "ay" in their speech? To my ears, this glide is the main thing which makes "met" and "mate" sound differently.

Probably not, because this diphthong is quite often treated as though it were a "pure" vowel sound when children are learning about phonics in school. And at least in the US, dictionaries have traditionally used māt (that is, one vowel with a macron) instead of meɪt (that is, with a diphthong) to show the pronunciation of "mate". On the other hand, English speakers who've studied foreign languages, and perhaps also professionally trained singers, might be more conscious of the fact that the so-called "long a" (ā) is really a diphthong with two distinct vowel sounds.

The most interesting question: would an "average" English speaker hear the difference between Russian "все" and "всей", "уже" and "ужей" (genitive plural of "уж") etc.? If yes, how would they describe the difference?

I think an average English speaker would have absolutely no trouble hearing the difference between "все" and "всей". They'd describe the second one as rhyming with "play", and the first one as rhyming with the interjections "feh!" or "meh!" (Both of these basically express scorn/dislike but "feh" was borrowed directly from Yiddish, while "meh" was popularized by The Simpsons.)

However, I would expect that an English speaker learning to speak Russian would, at first, often mispronounce все and уже as though they were saying всей and ужей. And the reason is simply that (except for "feh" and "meh") our tongues aren't accustomed to saying the [ɛ] vowel at the end of a word.

Originally Posted by Throbert McGee

Probably not, because this diphthong is quite often treated as though it were a "pure" vowel sound when children are learning about phonics in school. And at least in the US, dictionaries have traditionally used māt (that is, one vowel with a macron) instead of meɪt (that is, with a diphthong) to show the pronunciation of "mate".

That's very interesting, thank you for detailed answers!
I am particularly interested in "relative language peception", if there is such a term.
BTW, do you know any on-line resources where I could see how phonics is taught to children in US schools?

You would probably find it interesting to learn how Russian students understand English and Russian phonetics from their perspective.

At first, let me tell you a story how we learned to pronounce English vowel combinations AY, EY, OY, UY at school. You may find it funny Of course, I know it is not a scientific approach, and it is not phonetically accurate. But it worked!

I think you know that many Russian children learn English as a foreign language at school. In the time of my school ages, most of schools usually offered to choose between three foreign languages to learn – English, German, or French. A foreign language was a mandatory school subject, but the quality of how it was taught then was often quite poor. I am not sure about the nowaday education.

OK. Here’s the story:
We learned how to read single vowels in "open" (date-theme-hide-vote-mute) and "closed" (can-bet-bit-hot-cut) syllables. And then we learned how to read some vowel combinations, including AY, EY, OY, UY.
But nearly ALL my classmates (including myself ) could not understand, why on earth we have to learn those 4 combinations separately!!!
We saw a very simple logic in how it worked.

Let’s consider how a single vowel letter is pronounced in a closed syllable (I’m deliberately giving a Russian transliteration to show how Russian perceive the sounds):
Cat – кэт
Set – сэт
Sit – сит
Lot – лот (we learned British English at school, in American English I would rather right "лат" instead)
Cut – кат
Yes, most of Russians do not even now that the vowels in "cat" [kæt] and "set" [sɛt] are different. And many people even think that "bed" and "bad" are homophones!
Now, let’s consider how vowel combinations AY, EY, OY, UY are pronounced:
Bay – бэй
Whey – wэй (I keep the English letter for "w")
Boy – бой
Buy – бай

So, from naïve Russian perspective, those words just obey the same rules as the words with "closed" syllables (if we put "y" as a final consonant, similar to Russian "й"), compare:
Bat бэт – bay бэй
Wet wэт – whey wэй
Top топ – toy той
But бат – buy бай (yes, the vowel in "but" is [ʌ], but Russians hear it as our "а").

That’s why I could not understand in my school ages why we have to treat "ay, ey, oy, uy" as special combinations, if we can easily do with treating them just as independent letters, "y" being a consonant.

At second, a few words on how Russians perceive their own phonetics.
All Russian children, as well as many adults, believe there are 10 vowel sounds in Russian: а, е, ё, и, о, у, ы, э, ю, я. Although we learn at the elementary school that "е, ё, ю, я" represent sound combinations [йэ, йо, йу, йа] rather than independent vowels, many people quickly forget about that. I used to teach elementary English to some Russian adults, and I was often asked "Is there a rule that “ye” combination (e.g. in “yes”, “yet”) makes the Russian “е” vowel"? That’s how our spelling system cheats us

Here is one way of learning A, E , I , O, U

Freeez - I.O.U. 1983 - Original Version - YouTube

There are many variations on AEIOU online

A-E-A-E-I-O-U-U
and sometimes Y
A-E-A-E-I-O-U-U
and sometimes Y

A-E-A-E-I-O-U-U
and sometimes Y
A-E-A-E-I-O-U-U
and sometimes Y

You tell me that you love me every day
When we're alone I really feel in love
But when we're out with friends I see a change
You treat me bad, I feel like second best

I want your love (I want your love)
Give me your love, girl (Give me your love)
That's how I feel, I want it to be real

I want your love (I want your love)
Give me your love, girl (Give me your love)
I need your touch and I, I owe you so much

A-E-A-E-I-O-U-U
and sometimes Y
A-E-A-E-I-O-U-U
and sometimes Y

(Oh) A-E (I really care) A-E-I (I really care) O-U-U
(I really care, care, care) I sometimes lie
(Oh) A-E (I really care) A-E-I (I really care) O-U-U
(I really care, care, care) I sometimes lie

Do you realize some things you say?
I know you do, it makes me so confused
I'm sure this ain't the way that love should be
Let's get it right, it's much too good to lose

I want your love (I want your love)
Give me your love, girl (Give me your love)
That's how I feel but I want it to be real

I want your love (I want your love)
Give me your love, girl (Give me your love)
I need your touch and I owe you so much


A-E-A-E-I-O-U-U
and sometimes Y
A-E-A-E-I-O-U-U
and sometimes Y

(Girl) A-E (I really care) A-E-I (I really care) O-U-U
(I really care, care, care) I sometimes lie
(Girl) A-E (I really care) A-E-I (I really care) O-U-U
(I really care, care, care) I sometimes lie

A-E-A-E-I-O-U-U
and sometimes Y
A-E-A-E-I-O-U-U
and sometimes Y

(Girl) A-E (I really care) A-E-I (I really care) O-U-U
(I really care, care, care) I sometimes lie
(Girl) A-E (I really care) A-E-I (I really care) O-U-U
(I really care, care, care) I sometimes lie

Girl
Girl

I need your love, I want your love, give me your love (Give me your love)
I need your love, I want your love, give me your love (Give me your love)
I need your love, I want your love, give me your love (Give me your love)
I need your love, I want your love, give me your love

Girl (Girl), I know I owe you so much
But can't I pay you
With just, with just one touch?

And girl, I know you care
I'll never love another
To that, to that I swear

A-E-A-E-I-O-U-U

A-E-A-E (I owe you girl) I-O-U-U, I sometimes lie (Yeah)
A-E-A-E (I owe you girl) I-O-U-U, (Owe you girl) I sometimes cry (Oh)
A-E-A-E-I-O-U-U, I sometimes lie